


Through Wolf's Eyes

by Miladygrey



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Attraction, Community: bubbleficathon, Gen, M/M, Marauders Friendship, werewolfiness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-17
Updated: 2016-01-17
Packaged: 2018-05-14 10:20:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,300
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5739985
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Miladygrey/pseuds/Miladygrey
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"As if Remus ever needed reminding of his monthly curse, certain things always started happening as the full moon drew nearer. Fits of insomnia. A tendency to walk softly, and talk a bit less. A sudden fondness for rare meat. And other things."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Through Wolf's Eyes

**Author's Note:**

> Marauder-era, exact time unspecified, but the Pensieve events witnessed by Harry in OotP are referenced.
> 
> This was written in 2004--it's quite possible that HBP and DH contradict some things said herein, but damned if I can remember. It was also one of my first long fics, and my first attempt at anything remotely resembling M/M. Originally written for the 2004 Bubbleficathon for the lovely pocketwitch, with the prompts "Remus/Snape and a loofah". There's no sex, but there are naked wet teenage boys and hormones, hence the warning.

As if Remus ever needed reminding of his monthly curse, certain things always started happening as the full moon drew nearer. Fits of insomnia. A tendency to walk softly, and talk a bit less. A sudden fondness for rare meat. And other things.

He knew they were coming, and where they were coming from. Earth and clay pots and a ghost of mandrake pungency meant that Peter had been finishing up a project in the greenhouses. James smelled almost overpoweringly of aftershave (a lupine thought noted disdainfully that prey and predator alike would smell him coming a mile away), but beneath that of damp stone and lemon drops. Remus didn‘t even bother to look up from his scroll as the two boys joined him in his stalk through the hallway. “How was the meeting, Prongs?”

“That’s beyond mad, you know. You could make a fortune with that trick, collect Knuts in the square at Hogsmeade or something.” James’ wide grin showed that he was only joking and Remus shouldn’t take him seriously, good old mate, ha ha. It was an expression Remus was very weary of at the moment. “The meeting went fine. They tried to shove some dull things at me--post-graduate rune studies at Durmstrang, a desk job at the Ministry of Magic--but I’m holding out for an apprenticeship at the Nimbus Corporation. Think of meeting all the Quidditch teams and providing them with their brooms. I’d get free tickets! So’ve you seen Padfoot?”

“I think he had a study group in the library. His last chance to bring his marks in Charms up before exams.”

Peter cocked his head, a sharp inquisitiveness bringing out the ghost of the rat beneath his skin. “You’re doing well enough in Charms--why aren’t you tutoring him?”

_Because sitting next to Sirius for a long period of time and pretending to be interested in charms is far beyond my acting ability._ His brain knew that his unrequited love for Sirius Black had absolutely no chance of becoming a reality. His body, however, insisted on being overeagerly hopeful. “Because Sirius is always too busy fiddling with his hair and grinning at girls to listen to me. I’m just his mate.” He let a glower show on his face.

Swallowing visibly, Peter nodded and shut up. Remus smiled, and almost lolled his tongue out in silent inhuman laughter. _Rodent--no, Wormtail!_ He pushed the thought away, but that feeling of disdain that didn’t translate into language remained.

James was talking again, cheerfully unaware of anything passing between Remus and Peter. “…everyone outside enjoying the sun, even Slytherins. Except Snivellus Snape; I haven’t seen him all day. No loss, and leaves more sun for the girls to lie about in.”

The insult, even though not applied to him, made Remus wince. It was a fine time to start having empathy, but he figured he might as well. He’d had his share of the insults already, from other sources. “I’m not disagreeing he’s a whingeing twit as often as not, Prongs. But honestly, if you want to feel superior, you could pick a better target than the most downtrodden scrap of a Slytherin ever to get sorted into that dungeon.”

“Remus, you’re too damn nice. It’s his own fault he’s ‘downtrodden’. Merlin, look at him.”

“Walking sludge,” Peter offered helpfully.

“Exactly.” James grinned at Peter, who trotted along by his side even more worshipfully, if that were possible. “Bad enough he’s a Slytherin, but he’s even a Slytherin who’s got no idea how to behave in a backstabbing House like that. No sense of self-preservation. He trots around with his nose in spell books Madam Pince would no doubt disapprove of, can’t be bothered to clean himself or his clothes, and doesn’t even care enough to pretend to join in anything. His own House doesn’t give two Knuts for him.”

Remus was starting to argue that Slytherins weren’t allowed to show anything resembling usual interpersonal relationships, but then a familiar presence asserted itself. Sirius threw an arm around his shoulders, and he half-stumbled under the combined drag of weight and surprised delight. As always, Sirius smelled faintly of the woods, and sweat, and today of the wise dust of the library.

“Let it go, Moony. Snivellus isn’t anything. What’s important is the next Hogsmeade trip--and whether or not Lily Evans is coming along with us.” He grinned at James. “Well, Prongs, you poor lovesick lout?”

“I’ve _tried_ to talk to her--” For someone like James Potter, who had what several Gryffiindor girls meltingly called a ’noble profile’, to look so sulky was quite a sight.

“Want me to change and chase her around the Whomping Willow?” Sirius offered. “You could rescue her, and she’d be ever so grateful. I can see it.”

“I could change too,” Peter suggested hopefully. “Skitter around the girls’ common room, give them all a fright.”

“You’re just hoping to see Em Masterson in her bathrobe,” James said good-naturedly. “You’re not offering to howl at her, Remus?”

_Prey._ He shook his head, trying to dispel a sudden, viciously clear image of pretty Lily as nothing more than meat, and kept his voice casual with effort. “If you can’t catch a girl on your own, Prongs, I’m not going to help you along.”

They were passing the Gryffindor entrance by then. James snorted, and made a great show of hefting his broomstick. “I’m off to Quidditch practice. Come scrape my body off the field if I’m not back by dinner.”

Sirius laughed, Peter grinned, and Remus smiled tiredly and said “Scarlet and miniver” to the Fat Lady.

Inside, Peter vanished into their room, saying something about a scroll left unfinished. Remus made as though to sit down in one of the armchairs, but Sirius’s big hand remained on his shoulder. “Hey. What?”

“Nothing.” He could have just sat down, but the contact was comforting, and rare enough to be cherished.

“Bollocks, Moony, you went grey out there.”

He looked up into Sirius’s strong, handsome face. There was honest concern there, and he willfully decided to read it as worry over him personally, and not just a friend having an off day. “James is a git sometimes, is all.”

Now the concern was mixed with incomprehension, and Remus made an effort to explain. “He doesn’t think. Not that he ever thought much, but--it’s all Evans these days, have you noticed? Evans and Quidditch, and sod-all else. That whole scene with Snape the other day…”

“Never saw you as a crusader against injustice, Moony.”

“I’m going to bloody well have to be!” he snapped, irritation switching from one grievance to the other. “I’ve done some reading, and there’s so much prejudice against known werewolves. They can’t get jobs, can’t live in cities, aren’t allowed around kids. If anyone else knew about me here, now, I’d probably be expelled just to keep a mob of angry parents from storming the castle and dragging me out! And here’s James, making some casual bloody joke about me using my unwanted, painful unholy _curse_ to get him the girl he fancies!” His voice was rather louder than he’d meant it to be. “It’s two days to the full moon.” He finally did sit down, feeling the suddenly chilled spot on his shoulder where Sirius’s hand had been. “I’m edgy, having wolf thoughts. James isn’t helping.”

“He _wasn’t_ thinking, you know that,“ Sirius said quietly. “I was that way over Johanna Gray for half last term, remember? It’s nothing personal against you, Moony.”

“And Snape?”

“Who cares about Snape?” He saw the broad shoulders hunch out of the corner of his eye, heard dismissal in the deep voice. And the wolf in his mind growled in mild boredom, a mental suggestion of Snape on all fours, grovelling. _Lowest in the pack--_

There was nothing but to let it go. “Nobody, clearly.” He leaned away, out of the ambiance of Sirius‘s heat and scent.

Sirius shrugged, running a hand through his hair out of habit. “My homework’s done--I think I’ll go watch the Gryffindor practice. You should come.”

“I’m fine. Don’t fancy dodging a Bludger.” He tried to just sound tired, and not angry and a little hurt. “You go. I’ll find you--all of you--at dinner.”

The sounds of Sirius leaving, the portrait door closing again, the mutter of Mark McCormick’s bored wizard chess set by the fire, were barely audible to Remus amid the continuing loop of his own thoughts. He didn’t know why the persecution of Severus Snape--a sport pursued by several other Hogwarts students besides James, Sirius, and Peter--should bother him so much. Everything James had said was true. Snape invited ridicule, and only egged on his tormentors by raising what hackles he had and trying to fight back.

_As did I._ Those first few months of being a werewolf had been as close to hell on earth as Remus ever hoped to come. He had been twelve different things all at once: angry that such a thing had happened to him, grieving over freedoms suddenly lost, desperately afraid of what he would become when the moon waxed full. And confused, so painfully confused, when kids he’d called friends started throwing rocks, and adults he’d trusted glared at him with blindly frightened eyes. He’d tried to defend himself against their unreasoning fear and malice, first with words, then with his fists. He’d almost drawn blood, once--that had led to his family’s first move.

Snape wasn’t contagious. At least, he was fairly sure that Slytherinism wasn’t catching. But he remembered, as clearly as though it were only days past instead of years, his trapped, angry feeling that every man’s hand was against him, and so he was against every man. Since he was no longer even considered a man by them. It was wrong on a very basic level to treat another human being like that, strangeness or no--

_Pack stands with pack. All packs stand against Others._ Images ghosted in black and white, two wolf packs snarling at each other, then abruptly mingling to fight together when a troll crashed out of the woods and snatched at a young cub.

A group of second-years came chattering in, rousing irate comments from a couple of the portraits, and dispelling the not-memory in a swirl of winter grey. As they flopped into armchairs and began to communally finish their homework, Remus stood up and slipped out the door. There was one good, almost-certain-to-be-private place to brood in. Remus knew, from judicious eavesdropping and from Nadia Rousseau (Head Girl of Hufflepuff and a friend), that the Hufflepuff prefect bathroom was always empty on Saturday afternoons. The house-elves cleaned that area then, and despite the students’ general fondness for the little creatures, nobody wanted to be caught stark by them. They tended to giggle.

The air in the bathroom was clingingly warm, almost palpable enough for him to tug handfuls around himself, and steam eddied in phantom clouds. He heard the water ripple and splash against the marble tub. _Of course someone would be here now…_ “Don’t mind me,” he said, pitching his voice to carry a bit. “Just getting away from overeager second-years--”

“Go away.”

The voice was gravelly, sharp, familiar. The wetness of the room masked most personal scent, but Remus knew that voice. It was as alien to the fancy room as he himself was. “Snape? You‘re Slytherin, what are you--?”

“And you’re a Gryffindor. I said, _go away_. Go tell your friend the Head Girl.”

“And admit I was in here?” Curious, Remus stepped through a billow of steam and saw an outline huddled chin-deep in hot water. “What in Merlin’s name are you doing?”

Dark, deepset eyes rolled expressively. “Bathing. You should try it sometime; wet dogs never smell good.”

He knew he was being baited, but that didn’t stop an angry flush from rising to his cheeks. “I know you Slytherins have to bathe in ice water with sackcloth to scrub, but I still can’t see why you’d sneak into the Hufflepuff prefects’ bathroom. Hoping to catch a glimpse of Nadia or Zoe? Or you just didn’t want your housemates to see those sorry grey knickers you flashed for James the other day?” A heap of patched black robes had been left on the tiled floor by the bath, and Remus made as if to investigate them.

Severus lunged at him, warm water splashing up over Remus’s ankles. He was yelling something about curses, but all Remus saw were the scrawls marking his pale torso. The lines, an ugly reddish shade that seemed smeared into his skin, were actually words. Stupid, cruel insults written on the Slytherin’s body. “Someone Marqued you.” It didn’t come out as a question, he knew the spell when he saw it.

The other boy sank back down to chest-deep, scowling. “You know what this is?”

“Marqueing. Like magical tattoos. It used to be a form of punishment, someone’s crimes were written on their skin for everyone to see.”

“Didn’t know they had a name.” Severus fished a sponge and washcloth from where they drifted, and started to rub at one arm, roughly. The skin there was turning an irritated red, suggesting he’d been doing this for a while. “Woke up this morning with them. I had to sneak out. Ice water and sackcloth--” He sneered as he mimicked Remus. “--didn’t help, so I thought to try this.”

“Ordinary soap and water don’t erase marques. I know.”

“Sympathy from a bloody werewolf. I’ve hit rock bottom.”

“I could find you a loofah?” Remus offered without much hope.

The fierce scrubbing motions stopped briefly. “Ah. A lower place.”

“I’m serious. They really do help…” It mattered, somehow, that his offer of help should be accepted. Absolution or pity or something. “Better than sackcloth, or the horrible soap in your bathrooms.”

“And how would you know?” Severus’s voice sank back down into its usual black, disaffected mutter as he scoured his skin.

He kept calm with a small effort. Easier than it had been, really. “Last holiday, three punks caught me walking home late, marqued “Buggering Werewolf Poof” on my forehead, and rolled me in a mud-and-gravel pit. I didn’t leave the house till I got every last bit off. Spells, milled soap, and a loofah. Muggles have had one or two good ideas.”

Damp quiet, the sounds of dripping water magnified. The wolf curled its tail around its feet and waited patiently.

“I’ve got nothing to lose.” There was a brief splash as Severus submerged himself, then resurfaced pawing wet black hair away from his face. Turning, his back was clearly visible, and Remus winced at the sight of more words scrawled in dried-blood red over the sallow skin, as if a crate of Punishment Quills had been writing for hours. The words were no more than the usual insults, but to have them embedded so with the Marqueing spell… “Chest, too?”

“Yes. They were thorough.” He could hear Snape’s lip curling. “D’you want to see those, too?”

“No.” The insults never really varied. Different words, similar sentiments, they all boiled down to _outcast unclean!_ in the end. “Half a moment. Got a feeling my kit’s on the way.”

One of the house-elves had a fondness for him, and a small bundle containing herbs and fine soap as well as a clean loofah was nudged discreetly out of a tiny door behind a tangle of hot water pipes. Making a mental note to stop by the kitchen one night soon and thank Pook himself, Remus started rubbing rosemary and rue into the poof of material. “Come up and sit at the edge. I can’t very well throw this to you.”

The splashing sounds were slow and reluctant, but they were coming closer. Remus concentrated on the loofah and herbs ( _lull the prey,_ the wolf thought smugly), murmuring charms. The thought was enough for this sort of spell, though he’d often wondered what simple cleaning charms like this would do if augmented by a wand...

“What are you doing?” Severus was a damp shadow smelling of steam and lye soap. Remus looked up and held the other boy’s hooded dark eyes without thinking, staring his rival down. Severus blinked, scowled, then tilted his head away, heavy hair hiding his eyes and breaking the stare.

The victorious smile that threatened to appear on Remus’s face was not a real smile, more a baring of teeth, and he swallowed it with effort. “A basic counterspell, good against anything that leaves physical evidence behind. A strengthening charm to help against the Marqueing. Rosemary for remembrance, implying that you don’t need the visible reminder of the marques anymore--”

“--and rue for cleansing. Herb of grace.” Remus’s surprise must have shown; Snape rolled his eyes. “I go to Herbology too. Potions make more sense, but herbs go into potions, so…”

“Right.” The green scent of rosemary and astringency of rue mingled with steam--and the sudden pungency of damp, none-too-clean fabric emanating from his shirt. The fastidious wolf was disgusted, and Remus found it hard to disagree. “Soap up with this, then use the loofah. Don’t scrub any harder on the marques than on anything else, and don’t think about them.”

“Easy for you to say.” Severus took the lavender bar of soap, eyed it as though he’d never seen such a fantastical invention before, but proceeded to put it to use. Remus peeled out of his clinging shirt meanwhile, reminding himself to put the thing in the wash-basket as soon as he got back to Gryffindor Tower. How could he not have noticed the smell earlier?

A not quite coherent mutter drew his attention back to Snape. The boy’s pale back was contorted into a rather uncomfortable arch-twist as he tried to reach the unreachable spot in the middle of his back. A vertebra snapped warningly, and Severus spat a curse. “Buggering black bucca-dhu--”

Too much to hope for, he supposed, that Severus Snape might consider asking for help. With an internal sigh of frustration, Remus dropped his shirt on the floor and walked up to the edge of the sunken bath, behind the bent figure. “Here, give me the loofah--”

Severus flipped him a rude gesture with his soapy free hand.

The wolf snarled, and something more human in Remus clenched its fists in blind frustration. _What the hell do I have to do just to help one stubborn Slytherin?_ Without thinking, he reached out and closed a hand firmly over Severus’s nape.

Slippery warm skin flexed under his hand. Remus was so focused on the intriguing sensation that Snape’s hoarse yell of outrage barely registered. He dug his fingers in lightly, pressure on the warmth (but no puncturing, not without claws). _Subdue._

The movement of the warm body under his touch ceased. Remus blinked, staring at his hand on the back of Severus’s neck. Differing shades of pale. Snape never seemed to see light at all. Remus at least had moonlight.

“Take the bloody loofah,” Severus said, abrupt and rough. “If you want it that much--”

He took the little sponge with his other hand, unwilling on a very basic level to relinquish contact. Touch of any kind was so rare. “Hold still.” There was, he noticed, a hint of a growl in his voice. Severus must have noticed as well; he kept his mouth shut and didn’t move.

The marques had faded slightly, down to a middling scabrous brown instead of the red shades of half-open wounds, and the edges were blurring into nothingness. Remus slowly worked the loofah over that one spot in the middle of Severus’s back, and made a pleased sound when the red promptly lessened. He kept scrubbing, moving the sponge in small circles, letting the slow repetitive motions soothe the wolf inside. A few red loops and lines reached up almost to the sharp delineations of Severus’s shoulder blades, and Remus leaned over to rub them away.

Severus grunted at the shift in position, swaying forward. The hand Remus had kept on his nape slipped, and for a minute he was flailing amid soap and heat for anything that might provide a solid handhold.

Shoulder, and shoulder. Snape had managed to stand up, giving Remus something to grab onto, and the two boys regained their balance. Remus refocused, and found himself looking at the top of Severus’s head. The Slytherin’s hair didn’t have that disheveled greasy look to it for once, just sleek and wet and black, trailing to a little point down the back of his neck.

“You can let go of me now,” Severus said aggrievedly, starting to turn his head. “If those marques aren’t off me yet, there’s nothing that can be done, and I already smell like Dumbledore’s tea.”

_Dominant._ The wolf was so matter-of-fact that it didn’t occur to Remus to question it. _The lowest submits._

He deliberately dug his fingers into Severus’s shoulders, kneading almost hard enough to push the smaller boy down. When he felt resistance, he dropped his head, resting his chin on one wet rosemary-scented shoulder, and exhaled a soft growl into his ear. No words, they were unnecessary. Just the growl.

The response was immediate and pleased him--the thin body bent submissively, chin dropping to bare the neck. He leaned further into the C-curve of narrow back, chest to stippled spine, letting the lesser one feel his weight. Skin rubbed, slightly coarse with the beginnings of hair and slick with warm moisture, and that also pleased him on a much deeper level.

The hollow behind his ear smelled confused and bittersweet, a tangle of herbs. The wolf didn’t know their names, only that the scent was pleasant. He tasted the soft skin with a flick of his tongue tip--dark, earthy sweetness.

Severus made a sound, a very small sound, and his head fell to one side in what (to the wolf) was a display both of weakness and willingness. More skin to taste now, and he pushed his face gently into the curve and line of the boy’s neck, nipping at the rapidly fluttering pulse. Blood beat warm under pale skin, but he wasn’t hungry. Not really. He closed his eyes, feeling the brush of black hair against his cheek. Black hair was good. Was his packmate, the other one like him who ran…

_Padfoot. Sirius._ Names, and words, and rational thought, came back in a searing rush.

_Oh. My. God._

He ( _Remus, my name is Remus Lupin_ ) pulled away from Snape’s pliant body in a desperate revolt of limbs, almost slipping on the tile. Severus turned to look at him, dark brows furrowed in confusion, and Remus kept his eyes locked somewhere to the left of that questioning face. He didn’t dare look down. He hoped fervently Severus wouldn’t either; his body’s reaction to those moments of intimate contact was achingly obvious.

“Anise.” Words were coming out of his mouth, and since they had nothing to do with what had just happened (mostly), he let them. It saved his brain from having to think much about it. “You smell like anise. And juniper, and cloves.”

The black, water-sleeked head nodded, and Remus forcibly did _not_ remember the damp feather-touches on his cheek. “Herbs for protection. Got the plants from Herbology, and mixed a balm up in Potions.” One half of his mouth curved up in a sardonic not-smile. “Like I said, I’ve nothing to lose.” He looked down, touched his chest. “The marques are gone.”

Remus took a few more steps away, grateful for the innocuousness of the statement. “Yes, they are. You’ll have to do it again if--whoever--tries the spell again, but if they see you’ve managed to remove them, they probably won’t perform it again. It’s very draining.”

Severus nodded again, twisting to check his back, and Remus looked away, feeling the blush burning his face.

“Was that all you wanted for it, then?”

“What?”

“A kiss and a cuddle.” Severus sounded far too calm. And too…not resigned. Almost willing. “Nothing’s free. I didn’t mind, you know--” Black eyes up to meet his, for once not hard. But not totally truthful, either. The wolf knew the marrow of things. Best to be under the protection of a stronger wolf, however you go about it. Liking it is not a prerequisite, though it helps. And it was tempting. For one angry, aching minute, it was tempting. Black hair and pale skin, after all, and if it wasn’t the one he wanted, well, it was still something he _wanted_.

But there was one fatal flaw. “No,” Remus said, soft and clear. Pity was one thing, help was another, but there were limits. ”No. You’re not--not--”

The wall came up in Severus’s eyes again, and he climbed out on the other side of the bath, groping for a towel. “I imagine,” he said coldly over his shoulder, “that if I could transform into something with fur, then you might be intrigued enough.”

“I don’t want anything from you. Rosemary and rue are easy to get, and since it happened to me…” He stared at Severus’s naked back, now nothing but white skin and the bone shapes beneath. “No payment. Nothing owed. Nothing, Severus.”

“Which is all I am to you. And Black, and Potter, and Pettigrew. As ever.” Pulling his clothes on with impatient jerks, Severus stalked past Remus without bothering to say anything else. Bitter anise flavored the steam in his wake.

Slowly, Remus tugged his old shirt on over his head. The scent of mildew was strong and coated his throat, and he buried his head in his hands for a few seconds. Breathed in rosemary and rue. And remembered, and rued.


End file.
